Author Archives: Simon Appleby

The Cupid Effect was my first novel to be published and it recently received a revamp with a new cover, which is why I wrote a new introduction to it, explaining why it is so special to me.

It’s 3.30 a.m. on a dark October morning and I’m wide awake because I’ve just finished writing my next book – The Ice Cream Girls – and my body clock is out of synch with . . . pretty much everything. I have a few months’ worth of taped programmes to catch up, a pile of admin that will probably bury me if it topples over and a suspicion that all the things I promised to do ‘once I’ve finished the book’ will require my immediate attention.

But, I love this about my life. I love writing and everything that has to fit around it. And, since I really should try to get some sleep/reorder my flat/revert to normal eating habits/get my ‘normal’ life back, I thought I’d remind myself and you all about where my writing career started, by reproducing below the new introduction to The Cupid Effect .

The Cupid Effect was my first novel to be published and it recently received a revamp with a new cover, which is why I wrote a new introduction to it, explaining why it is so special to me. Hope you enjoy reading this little love note to The Cupid Effect , and I’ll see you next time when my life will be a little more ordered-ish!

The Cupid Effect: Where It All Started Every time I go into a shop that sells books, I always check to see if they have any of my novels. Even now, over half a decade after my first book was published, I still feel a thrill to see my name ‘in lights’; experience a glow of pride to see my words on a shelf.

I must admit I get an extra thrill whenever I see The Cupid Effect . I love all my books equally, it’s just (to loosely paraphrase George Orwell) I love Cupid a fraction more equally than the others.

Cupid may not be the novel that put my writing in front of a worldwide audience, but I will always have a special affection for it for many reasons. One reason is that I share certain similarities with the main character. I’m always at pains to point out that I am not my main players, but if I was forced to name a character I share most traits with, it’d be Cupid’s Ceri D’Altroy. She and I are both sci-fi geeks who are obsessed with the same TV show; we’ve both taught psychology; and we both have a large number of long-sleeved tops in are sartorial repertoire. Probably most crucially, we both have a habit of listening to people’s problems then giving advice we really wish said advisees wouldn’t take.

Another reason for my big love for Cupid is that it makes me laugh. It has its serious moments, but there are many, many scenes and phrases that tickle me enough to make me LOL (as the kids say). I laugh mainly because I can remember what inspired that particular scene or phrase.

My love of Cupid is that bit deeper, though, because it is my first born. The novel that allowed me to drop the first two letters of ‘unpublished’ and brand myself a published novelist. That day in February 2003 when I walked into a London bookshop and saw my name emblazoned upon the cover of a book is a day that permanently changed my life. It represented the culmination of months of writing every second I wasn’t earning money to pay my bills. It represented years of reading, writing and dreaming. It represented everything I’ve wanted since I was 13 years old and wrote my first full-length story. It represented me daring to follow my heart.

Cupid is essentially a book about having the courage to follow your heart and accepting that the power to change your life is in your hands. Not necessarily quitting your safe job and trying to do something you’re not sure you’re qualified for, like Ceri does, it is more about seeing what you would like to alter and striving to effect that change. Even if it is just a case of changing how you view your current circumstance.

As I said, I am proud of every single one of my books, and I love seeing them on the shelves of shops, so I’m especially excited that I’ll be seeing The Cupid Effect , ‘out there’ again, with a brand new cover: it’ll be showing me and the world where I started and how far I’ve come.

I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

© Dorothy Koomson 2009

If you’ve been following my exploits on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, then you’ll know I’ve been doing a lot of running around since publication of my tenth novel, That Girl From Nowhere. On publication day I went with one of the lovely peeps from my publishers to see Claudia Winkleman, Donna from Radio Gorgeous and Mariella Frostrop. I’d also popped into Magic FM just a week before to see fab Jo for the Magic FM book club.

After lunch and the radio chat, I also went to my publishers to see the lovely peeps who worked on the book and was greeted with this wonderful sight in the entrance. That was pretty overwhelming, but when I was given this present I almost burst into tears. I’m still in awe at how appropriate and beautiful it is. It’s a butterfly box with pages from the book. I can’t describe how it made me feel to get it.

After what turned into a hilarious night out, I had a series of reader events scheduled at which I read from the book, answered questions and signed anything readers asked me to. The first event was at Hove Library where I was interviewed by Sue-Kim Greene. The next night I was up in Bishops Stortford where again I was bowled over by how many lovely readers there are out there. Everyone was so friendly and welcoming.

After a few days of rest, I hit the rails again with a three-day trip, with first stop being Birmingham. I was on BBC Radio Scotland and then I had afternoon tea with Shay and Sunny at BBC Radio West Midlands. We had such a laugh and I may have mentioned that the way Sunny and Shay relate to each other reminded me of my relationship with my husband – didn’t realise that my other half was listening to the show via the wonders of the Internet. (‘I heard every word,’ was what he said when I called him after the show.) I also ran into super delightful Talesha who was working on the show. I met her years ago at my first ever Birmingham event and before I hit the road this time I said to my husband I was wondering if I’d see her again and there she was. She’s done so well for herself (if I can say that without sounding patronising). Also at the event in Brum, I saw some people who’d been to my last two events and it really was like seeing old mates again. The Birmingham event was organized by Writers to Readers. If you’re near there, do follow them on Twitter, like them on Facebook or sign up for their newsletter as they’ll be having lots of more author events.

The next day Emma, my publicist and I, went to Sheffield and met the amazing Paulette Edwards on BBC Radio Sheffield. I had no clue that the snooker was on while we were in Sheffield – not till Steve Davis walked past me. He looks exactly the same in real life. The event at Sheffield Library where I was interviewed by Joanne Canon, was another success in that I didn’t fall over, don’t think I embarrassed myself and I met lots of great people including a few who’d been to previous events. The visit to Sheffield was followed the next day by a trip to Leeds.

If you’ve read any of my books, you’ll know that there’s always a mention of Leeds because I lived there for several years. It was very emotional walking around the city centre, remembering the places I used to visit, how I felt, not knowing what life was going to throw at me next. After another wonderful event later at Waterstones Leeds, and we headed off back home. Seeing this at Leeds station before I got on the train, was a pretty darn perfect surprise.

Thank you, if you came along to any of the events. Maybe next time if you couldn’t make it this time. I had a fabulous time travelling all over, and I can’t wait to do it again, soon.

PS If you’d like me to participate at an event in your area, the best thing is to ask your local library or bookshop to put a request in via my publicist Emma Draude at EDPR and she’ll see if we can work it out.

If you’ve read The Flavours of Love you’ll know that the main character, Saffron, is holding a bowl of blackberries when she receives some devastating news.

While she eventually decides to use blackberries in a recipe that also has some significance to her, I’ve come up with this one that I hope you’ll enjoy. It’s really easy to make, really tasty and perfect for the hot weather.

You’ll need:

1 x 450g tub of Greek-style yoghurt 4 x tablespoons agave syrup 1 x tablespoon vanilla paste Half a punnet blackberries

The How To:

1. Put two sieves over a large bowl (a mixing bowl will do) and empty the contents of the Greek-style yoghurt into it. Cover the whole thing with Clingfilm and leave in the fridge for at least 2 hours. (The longer you strain the yoghurt for, the creamer the final frozen yoghurt will be – the best results I’ve had have come from straining overnight.)

2. Wash the blackberries (or whatever fruit you’re using) and roughly chop them up. Place in a covered bowl in the freezer for up to 1 hour. If the blackberries are particularly tart, I add half a teaspoon of agave syrup before freezing.

3. The excess liquid from the yoghurt will collect at the bottom of the bowl after the 2 hours (or however long you leave it) so tip the strained yoghurt into the mixing bowl of a stand mixer, or into another mixing bowl if you have a hand mixer. Add the vanilla paste and 2 tablespoons of the agave syrup. Mix until well blended then check for taste. If you’d like it a bit sweeter, add more agave syrup. (You can add more than the 4 tablespoons, but that’s enough for me.) Mix again until light and fluffy.

5. Remove the blackberries from the freezer and gently break them up.

5. Spoon the yoghurt mixture into a freezer-safe container with a lid. Slowly stir in the blackberries. Cover the container and place in the freezer.

7. After 45 minutes, remove from the freezer and stir the yoghurt mixture well, making sure to incorporate any frozen yoghurt or ice crystals that have formed along the sides or bottom of the container. Return to the freezer for another 45 minutes, then repeat the stirring procedure. Return to the freezer for a final 45 minutes.

8. To serve, remove from the freezer about 10 minutes before you want to eat it, then spoon into bowls or individual ramekins like the ones in the picture. You can also serve with cakes or pies – anything you’d usually serve with ice cream.

The Notes:

* I’ve also made frozen yoghurt using blueberries and raspberries and all three berries together. You can experiment with other fruit, obviously. If you fancy just a vanilla flavour, increase the amount of vanilla paste you use by half-teaspoons, checking until you have the right flavour.

* Since Greek-style yoghurt has already been strained before it is packaged, you don’t strictly need to strain it, but I do because it makes the frozen yoghurt taste much creamier.

* The same goes with whipping/whisking the yoghurt: it’s not necessary – as long as you make sure the vanilla paste and agave syrup are properly mixed in – but I find it makes the final texture much more like ice-cream.

*You also don’t need to partially freeze the fruit but doing so will stop it making the frozen yoghurt too watery and therefore icy and difficult to serve once set.

*Generally the frozen yoghurt gets eaten quite quickly in our house but you can keep it for a couple of weeks. * You can use Golden Syrup or honey if you prefer in place of Agave Syrup.

* I use Yeo Valley Organic Greek-Style Yoghurt, Neilsen-Massey Vanilla Paste and The Groovy Food Company Agave Syrup.

You can find out more about The Flavours of Love here

Dear Library (Every Public Library),

I wanted to tell you how much I love you. I would not be the person I am today without you. You were always there for me, throughout my life.

You were there, when I was a child and on the way home from school I would drop in and spend hours reading – nurturing and stoking and growing my love of books and the craft of fiction.

When I grew older and I couldn’t afford the textbooks needed so I could complete my O’Levels and A’Levels, you were there with the tomes required and the place to study and revise.

When I got even older and I had been to university both times and I was between jobs, you were the places that were there for me to hang out and read and generally not feel so alone on a daily basis.

When I got even older and I realised my dream of becoming a published author, a career I would not have if you hadn’t been there in the early days, you were there for me so I could attend readings and meet readers.

I love you, Library (Every Public Library). Not only for the things you have done for me over the years, but how you have helped people from all walks of life without question or without prejudice.

I’m sorry, so sorry, that the Government and local councils see you as an easy target for cuts and closures. Maybe it’s because you’ve always been so loyal – so quietly and diligently carrying out your job, helping to educate those who can’t afford to buy books and have too much of a moral centre to steal them from the internet. Maybe it’s because across the country, you provide a welcoming hub for communities to meet and thrive and support each other and that doesn’t seem to chime with the way those in power want our world to be right now. I’m so sorry you’re having to go through all that.

But I will continue to support you, to do what I can to highlight how wrong library closures are – how they damage the community and the collective intellect of our country.

Thank you, for being so wonderful and giving and supportive over the years – not only to me but to every other person who has walked through your doors.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

With my eternal love,

Dorothy Koomson

Author

Way back in 2007, I attended a library talk in Birmingham. It was a great event and I met some really nice people (as I did on all the library talks/events I participated in).

I remember, though, the lovely librarian at that particular event said to me when she met me, ‘I picked out my outfit for today very carefully because I know how much you’re into fashion. You will have already noted what I’m wearing.’ I was a bit taken aback to be honest that she thought, because I regularly describe clothes in my books, I must be a dedicated follower of fashion.

The truth is, I am and I am not.

I am in the sense that when I write about a character in a book, I try to describe the clothes they wear with detail and accuracy. I am not in the sense that given the choice between an expensive skirt and its monetary equivalent in books, the books would win – hands down.

I’m not a huge fan of shopping, either. I like the idea of it, and I regularly think that I need new jeans, new shoes, a new winter coat – especially as I have a tendency to wear my clothes until they are threadbare (those who love me have been known to re-gift said items in the bin). But the reality of shopping is altogether different from the fantasy. I like the seeing the clothes part; I despise the trying it on part. Individual cubicles are bad enough, but communal changing rooms are a horror that take me back to school locker rooms and the trauma of stripping off in front of a load of girls you barely know. So, I have once or twice – cough almost always cough – bought things without even turning in the direction of the changing room.

If I do brave the changing area, it is done in the manner of woman about to go into battle. I brace myself, unsure whether this shop will tell me with its little cardboard rectangle not only if I can afford said item but if I am a size twelve, fourteen or sixteen. I will prepare myself for either feeling that familiar tug of not being able to get the zip to close on one item, while swimming around in the next size up (in Australia I actually found a brand of jeans that had size 13 – which fit!). I will steel myself to look in the mirror and think, ‘Yes, I remember now, I am not a shop mannequin, and I am not the girl in the photo wearing this – this thing should not be on my body.’

Sometimes, my dressing room angst is compounded by the (un)kindness of strangers and shop assistants. I remember dashing into a big London chain store looking for a dress for an event that evening – another Dorothy speciality is finding something to wear minutes before the do – and grabbing a dress I liked off the rails and dashing for the changing room. It was one of those places where you have to leave the cubicle to look at the mirror outside. I was flustered so didn’t have time to brace myself before I whipped aside the curtain and stepped out.

The shop assistant, who was helping someone else looked me over and then said, ‘You actually don’t look that bad. When you picked up that dress I thought NO WAY, not at your age and with your shape. You’ve actually got quite thin legs, haven’t you?’ I was so taken aback, I could only smile vaguely at her before returning to my cubicle – she was lucky not to find herself wearing the wrong end of a verbal dressing down.

So, it’s pretty clear I do not follow every – or even any – fashion trend, which, of course, begs the question: why do I always mention the clothes the characters are wearing in my books? Because clothes maketh the person.

Clothes, how a person chooses to dress, says more about them than their hair or eye colour, their body shape or their place of birth, in a story. Clothes are often one of the first ways that people ‘experience’ us. How they see us and how they start to formulate ideas – rightly or wrongly – about who we are. This is especially true of written fictional characters. For example, if I described a woman going to a café for breakfast, you’d think she was just another ordinary person going about her business, but if I were to say she went to that café wearing a tiara, pink feather slippers and a red silk dressing gown, I’m pretty sure you’d start to wonder who this person is and why she is dressed like that.

It’s a simple device, but an effective one – and one I love to explore. When I am creating a character, I not only think about what they do, what colour their eyes are, and where they live, but also what they wear. What they say to the world with their sartorial selections; how they go into every different situation armed with what they see as an appropriate item of clothing. Just changing someone’s top from a low-cut v-neck to thick poloneck with a few keystrokes can change them from a vamp to a prude. I love it. It’s truly satisfying to know that simply describing a few pieces of clothing can add that extra depth to a character in my mind and on the page.

Some people don’t like to constantly read these descriptions in my books, but many, many more people tell me they do. And, to be honest, I absolutely love to write them. Because, for me, being able to put together an appropriate outfit for a person on the page, saves me from having to think too deeply about doing it in real life.

© Dorothy Koomson 2009

I was living in South London at the time and went up to central London to be interviewed by a reporter from The Voice newspaper at Borders in Oxford Street. I didn’t know how I’d feel when I saw a book on with my name on it. Excited, proud, a little shocked. I’d spent so long wanting to be published that the moment of it actually happening was a little overwhelming. I do remember wondering if that feeling would ever get tired and it hasn’t. It really hasn’t. As a side note, I was really sad when Borders closed. I always feel a real sense of grief when a bookshop closes but that was an additional sadness because it was where I saw The Cupid Effect on sale for the very first time.

At the time of writing, I’m working on novel number 9. It’s still in the ‘anything could happen’ stages and the characters are still doing their best to change with every word I write. If I’m honest, this is the stage where I am all over the place with the book. On the one hand I’m wondering if it’s such a good idea to be writing this story at this particular time, and on the other hand I love the challenge, the not knowing what is coming next and the getting-to-know-the-people-whose-stories-I’m-telling process. It’s never a simple case of sitting down and churning out the story. I have to live it as much as possible, and I feel very honoured to be able to do that.

The main character in the book I’m writing is very different to Ceri D’Altroy from The Cupid Effect. I think that’s in part because of how I’ve changed as a person. I’ve grown and altered, life and experience have imprinted themselves onto me and that has been passed into my writing. That’s not to say that I don’t love The Cupid Effect – it’s actually probably my favourite novel (don’t tell the others, that though) but if I were to write The Cupid Effect today it would in no way be the same novel. Which begs the question: would I ever rewrite it given the chance? The answer is: Absolutely not.

My first published book is perfect as it is, it is a testament to who I was back in 2002 (when I wrote it) and 2003 (when it was published). It’s a reminder of how I thought and how I felt about life back then. Rewriting The Cupid Effect, changing the story to fit in with my later work, would be like trying to rewrite the story of who I am and despite all the bits of my life that haven’t been ideal, I would never do that. I am who I am, and if I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be able to write the books that I have.

I am who I am, and who I am is someone who has the best job in the world – and who was able to share the fruits of that job with everyone ten years ago today.